UR IMPRESSIONS of others are determined not alone by information which these others directly provide; the verbal and gestural responses of a "stimulus person" (SP) are typically assessed by a perceiver in relation to the situation in which they occur (Jones & Thibaut, 1958). In many cases, the perceiver himself is a component of this situation. He must therefore consider his own behavior as a condition affecting the other's responses and the meaning he assigns to them. If A, for example, is aware of his own role in the instigation of hostile behavior in B, he is less likely to think of B as hostile or unpleasant, than he would if he were unaware of the provocation he himself provided.It seems to follow that, in the typical social interaction, evaluations of others on the basis of their responses are contingent on the perceiver's evaluation of his own behavior. If the perceiver behaves in a "good" fashion and this elicits a "bad" response (e.g., a negative evaluation, a frown, a critical comment) from the SP, the latter will be judged as personally bad by the perceiver. If the perceiver is unconvinced that his own behavior is good, worthy, or appropriate, he will be less likely to form a negative evaluation of SP. This line of reasoning suggests an experimental situation in which one person (the SP) responds with hostility to the behavior of another (the perceiver) which is or is not highly valued by the perceiver himself.
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